


Black Submarine

by Ytterbium



Category: Supernatural
Genre: (mostly), Alternate Universe - Human, Bisexual Dean, F/F, Implied Crowley/Dean Winchester, M/M, Rowena and Crowley are awesome and save the day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2016-03-04
Packaged: 2018-05-24 17:13:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6160711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ytterbium/pseuds/Ytterbium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They get a little further every time they try. Just a meter or two, but when they started they could barely leave the surface and now it takes them two days to get down. They still haven't reached the bottom though and perhaps they never will. Perhaps there is no bottom- they've all thought it, even though they never say it out aloud because Crowley would beat the shit out of them if they did. But Dean's dreamt about it, and he knows for sure Cas did too, because he could hear him cry in his sleep last time they went this far down. What if there is no bottom. What if this is a rift straight down into hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Black Submarine

It's just the six of them, now that Jo and Benny left. Crowley and his whatever the hell she is Rowena- he told them nothing about her at first, later he admitted to Dean that she was his mother. His mother my ass. He is at least fifty and she looks like thirty-five. Ruby and Meg, they were here long before Dean, when it was just them and Rowena and Crowley, and they're so close to each other Dean always feels like he's intruding even when they share stolen whisky with him and they drink together until one or all of them black out. And then there's him and Cas.  
They came here together, Dean, Jo and Cas, actually they came here because of him. Dean needed to get out after Sammy died, he needed to get somewhere else, somewhere black and different, someplace that would swallow him whole. So he came here, on this creepy-ass station in the middle of an ocean that belongs to no one, where the waves crash against the croaking metal pillars again and again and again and the trench, and the storms, and the darkness- he hasn't seen the sun in thirteen months. And Cas and Jo followed him even though Cas can't swim and Jo is afraid of the dark. But they came anyway, Jo because she's something like his sister and after he lost his brother he needed all the family he could get. And Cas because, well. And now Jo is gone and Dean misses her like he misses light and sleep and warmth and home. And, strangely enough, he misses Benny too.  
'They will be fine', Cas says. They are in the submarine, again, and oh how Dean hates that thing. He never thought he could hate something so much he feels like vomiting at the sight of it. It's just a thing, he told himself over and over again. It's just a thing. A frightening claustrophobic hallucination inducing thing, but a thing nevertheless. It shouldn't have this power over him. It shouldn't scare him as much as it does. He doesn't realize he's started shaking until Cas presses a hand against his heart, warm and calm. 'Dean. Breathe.' And Dean breathes, Cas does that to him. Like Dean's a broken clockwork and Cas a watchmaker who just pushes gently against one gearwheel until it clicks and the gears fit together again and on and on they go again. Dean never figured out how he does it, it's probably something to do with the vibration of his voice or the lightness of his touch, or probably it's something deeper, something old and alien within the frequency of his quarks. 'It's okay, I got it', Dean says as he's able to speak. 'Thanks, man. We should probably get down. Crowely's gonna kill us if we blow it. Again.' Cas doesn't answer, he takes his hand from Deans chest and climbs down into the control center. Dean follows, the ladder is slippery from the sweat on his hands. He takes the seat beside Cas, stares through the front window into the blackness of the ocean and thinks he can't do it. But then Cas takes his hand and Dean knows he can. So he hits the buttons and they sink down, down, down.  
They get a little further every time they try. Just a meter or two, but when they started they could barely leave the surface and now it takes them two days to get down. They still haven't reached the bottom though and perhaps they never will. Perhaps there is no bottom- they've all thought it, even though they never say it out aloud because Crowley would beat the shit out of them if they did. But Dean's dreamt about it, and he knows for sure Cas did too, because he could hear him cry in his sleep last time they went this far down. What if there is no bottom. What if this is a rift straight down into hell.  
Darkness swallows them just a few meters below the surface. Cas doesn't bother turning on the floodlight because they both now there's nothing there for it to shine on. The rift's narrow, just one or one and a half miles in width, or at least that's what Crowley's told them. You would think there would be walls or something, sedimentlayers or rocks or sand, whatever it is that trenchwalls are supposed to be made of, probably also dead corals or at least a fish, but there is nothing there. Never has been. In all the months they've been coming down here they've never seen a single thing.  
Dean gets up and starts moving, restless. He goes round the submarine, checks both hatches, the five small windows on every side and the one in the back, then he visits every corner and every room: the engine room, the infirmary, the restroom, the chamber where they keep all the measuring devices no one knows what they're for or how to operate them, the empty room- Deans skin starts itching every time he's in there, the thought why Crowley might have found it necessary to build a hermetically sealable room into his submarine bothers him- and back to the control center where Cas is smiling at him as he returns. Dean doesn't even know what he's looking for or what he would do if he found something out of the ordinary but he's made a habit of it in the early days and now it's far too late to let it go. And Cas lets him, as always, without a word. 'Can you hear the engines jarring?', he asks instead. 'Soothing, isn't it?' Soothing isn't exactly the word Dean would use, but then again Cas got a deadpan humor and no common sense. 'Yeah. It's a real melody', Dean answers. 'We got any rum left?' 'Dean-' Cas looks at him like he's his big brother or something and that's just weird. 'Yeah, yeah, okay, nevermind. Jesus.' They sit again in silence and Dean thinks how glad he is that Cas' still here, that he hasn't left with Jo and Benny, that he's still stupid enough to be his friend and that they're both still breathing.  
Cas starts singing then, Yellow Submarine by the Beatles like the good sixties-rock boy Dean taught him to be. 'I wish', Dean says, grinning, because really what else is there to do when you're scared to death? 'This thing would be a lot less creepy if it were yellow. Why has Crowley got to paint everything black. That's just not normal.' 'He thinks black suits him', Cas says after he loses track of the notes. 'Meg and I had a discussion with him about it once. Actually that's not entirely true. It was more like I told them about color theory and they were really mean about it and said colors were for ugly people.' 'You're not ugly', Dean says. 'Sure, you should probably shave and your hair's a mess and you dress like a junkie, but apart from that-' 'Thank you, Dean. I really appreciate that.' 'I'm just saying there's hope, you know. With real clothes and the right make-up you-' Something screames high-pitched and human, and Dean falls silent, laughter still in his throat. They stare at each other, Cas a little too wide-eyed. 'It's got to be the engines', Dean says as calm as he knows how to be. 'Of course. Yes. Surely it's the engines.' 'I should probably lock the doors-' 'Do that.' Dean hits some buttons and the doors between the different sections come slithering down. As soon as they're locked in the control center and there's fifty centimeters of steel between them and the rest of the submarine the tension drops a little, and Dean exhales.  
They sleep in the seats of the control center, curled around each other in search of life.  
There is a bunk in the back of the submarine, but it's far too small for two grown men, and they could probably take it in turns except they can't. Dean can't really sleep, so he just pretends and listens to Cas breathe and to calm down he thinks about Jo, because Jo's the fucking bravest person he's ever known.  
'I'm not going down there again', Jo had told Crowley. They were in the kitchen of the station, all seven of them together except Rowena who was doing creepy things in her creepy room again. Cas or Meg or Crowley had been cooking and Benny and Jo had just gotten to the surface, and now they were sitting around the table and eating something that looked like porridge and tasted like cement. Jo wasn't screaming or anything, just a calm, final statement: I'm not going down there again. 'And why', Crowley started very slowly, 'is that?' Everybody had stopped eating, Meg looked at Jo with her big brown eyes and her darling, no face, the air smelled like something was about to burn, Crowley was radiating heat and fury in red waves and Jo just stared at him like she was a little bit bored. 'Because there's something down there', she said. 'Something- something down there? Are you kidding me?' 'I'm really not. There's something in that rift, something in the darkness, and we all know it! It fucking calls to us at night, Crowley! You know- at first I thought you didn't know, I thought you couldn't feel it because you've never been down there yourself, but that's wrong, isn't it? You know exactly what I'm talking about.' 'I've got no clue what you're talking about. I think you've lost it. Still, I don't blame you. It's a tough job for a girl who's afraid of the dark.' Jo didn't bat an eye on that. 'Tell me Crowley, what is it, exactly, that we're looking for?' she asked, and holy shit now she'd done it. Now she'd asked the million dollar question, the one people used to get hanged for. Crowley looked at her like he wanted to eat her heart while it was still pumping, looked at the broken watch on his wrist and again at her and said: 'You've got ten hours. If you're still here at twelve o'clock I'm going to do something illegal and I will enjoy it. So take the boat and go, darling. But leave your brother, I'm enjoying his company way more than yours.'  
Dean helped Jo pack that night, she didn't own much, most of the few things she brought on the station were at some point lost to the sea. And then Benny showed up in Jos cabin, bags packed. 'I can't stay here without Jo', he told Dean. 'I'm sorry brother.' Dean got it, he really did. He wouldn't be able to make it without Cas, it was something that probably happened while they were down in the rift, something gradually shifting, the inability to leave the one person who's seen you at your very worst. He and Cas helped them to get the boat ready. It belonged to Meg and it was the only boat that was left, the one Dean, Jo and Cas had gotten on had been lost during one of the countless storms and Benny- how Benny joined them is another story for another life. The boat could barely carry two people, and there was just no way Dean and Cas would fit in there too even though Jo didn't weigh much. Probably one of them, but not both. Crowley joined them at some point, collar of his coat turned up, and he actually seemed a little bit moved as Jo wrapped her arms around Dean for goodbye. 'Bye, Dean', Jo said. 'We'll meet- when this is over, you and I are gonna meet, okay? In the tavern.' Dean nodded, and Jo hugged Cas, and Benny told Dean, 'See you around brother', and Jo actually thanked Crowley, because they all had complicated feelings when it came to him, and then they left. Dean, Cas and Crowley stared after them, watching the boat go up and down between the waves, and Dean prayed Benny was as good a sailor as he claimed. Crowley seemed relatively unconcerned that their only way out was rowing away. 'Mother says the next time frame is in about five hours', he said casually. 'And you two- you're gonna take it. You're gonna get down there and you're gonna come back up again in four days without an incident or whatever the hell it is that keeps happening to you two. Four days and not a minute sooner. Mother says we're almost there. So you hold it together boys.'  
It wasn't like nobody ever screwed up except the two of them but they certainly had the worst quota among all. Dean and Cas had recently developed a habit of fucking things up- or rather Dean had recently developed a habit of not handling being down in the rift really well and Cas- Cas had never been able to stomach Deans pain. It was mostly Cas, in the end, who pressed the button that brought them up again too soon, but he did it out of mercy or love or some shit, so in the end it was Deans fault, always Deans fault.  
'We can take next shift', Ruby'd even offered Dean after he and Cas blew it for the first time and Crowley'd threatened to drown them if they disobeyed again even though he knew that Dean knew he never would. Because Crowley may be his boss, but Dean doesn't really have a boss, and he's also sort of his friend. Not to mention the other time, the one time Dean went to his cabin and told him what he wanted him to do and Crowley didn't laugh or kick him out, he just held him down and fucked him until Dean blacked out and then never mentioned it again. 'Thanks, Ruby. But we got it.' 'You sure?' Ruby smiled that tiny smile, a little sarcastic and a little bit sad.  
'How do you manage it', Dean heard himself ask before he could stop it. Because Meg and Ruby, shit, they were fucking professionals. Not once had they come back up again too soon, and Dean had never heard them break down after, they were a little bit shaky and a little on edge, sure, but they never broke down the way Jo broke down or Benny or Dean himself. Ruby smiled. 'Meg, mostly. Also, I like the dark. I feel protected by it, like it's within me. Like it recognizes my painted-black soul.' 'Not very helpful, Ruby', Dean said dryly, and Ruby laughed. 'Sorry, I sometimes forget what a good boy you are. No but honestly, if it weren't for Meg I wouldn't go down there for a kingdom. But Meg-well. It has his perks being all alone for four days. If you knew the things Meg can do with her tongue- but if you knew, of course, I would have to carve something out of you.' 'I don't know anything about Meg's tongue', Dean promised, because sometimes he was actually scared of Ruby, just a little bit. And then he and Cas went down again, and he thought it would probably get better with time except that shit kept happening. And Ruby kept asking, and Dean kept saying no because he just knew if he took her offer one time he'd never enter that fucking submarine ever again. And now they're here, buried under miles and miles of darkness and ocean because maybe that's where they belong. Cas mumbles in his sleep in a language Dean doesn't recognize, Latin probably or Ancient Greek, it sounds like he's praying to ancient gods and Dean drifts off.

It happens when they're about one day deep. Dean's in the control seat and Cas' sitting on the floor doing yoga because that's how much of a weirdo he is, and then the engines stop. They just stop as if they felt now's a good time to die, suddenly there's no more vibration in the floor and in Deans spine and no more sound.  
Dean hits the floodlight and-  
There is someone out there. A man or a woman, he's not sure, the figure has longish hair floating around the head and is probably dead, has to be, crushed internal organs from the pressure of a whole ocean above them.  
And then- he turns. They stare at each other and Dean thinks now it's happened, he's finally lost it, and some slick, ugly part of him is relieved.  
Dean distantly registers that he's started hitting against the front window with everything he can find, trying to get through, that there's blood smeared across the glass and it's leaking out of his hands and his wrists, and Cas is talking or screaming but Dean can't hear him over the blood in his ears. And then Cas hits him like he's never hit him before, hard against the head with the intention to hurt, and everything goes black for a few seconds, and when Dean's there again he lies on the floor, Cas' body as an unmovable weight above him. 'Get off me', Dean breathes. 'I swear, get off me, Cas, or-' He tries to fight him, but Cas has pinned Deans hands above his head holds him down and he shouldn't be so much stronger than Dean but he is so all Dean can do is hit his own head against the floor. 'Dean, listen to me. That is not your brother.'  
'Wha- you mean, you can see him too?' Dean lifts his head a little so he can look through the glass, and Sam's still out there, watching them.  
'Of course I can see him. But whoever- whatever that thing is, it's not Sam, you know that, right? Sam died. He died a long time ago.'  
'How can you be sure', Dean winces, 'I've got to get out there, I have to talk to him, please Cas, we need to let him in-' 'We can't. We can't open anything. We would drown.' 'I don't care. I've got to talk to him, Cas- He didn't know- he died, and I never told him-' 'He knew', Cas says. 'Dean your brother is long gone. We watched him die. We burned his body. We mourned him.' Dean starts to cry, helpless and without sound. Some part of him knows Cas is right. Sam can't be here, he can't. He closes his eyes, and Cas lifts his head and looks at the thing that's still waiting out there, watching them like they're some sort of freakshow, and the thing looks back at him and fucking smiles and then it's gone and leaves a shockingly sudden emptiness behind. Cas remembers how to breathe. He lowers his head until it's right beside Deans, and then he waits until Dean stops crying and Cas can trust him again. 'I'm sorry I hit you', Cas says as he lets go. Dean doesn't answer. He sits up and looks down at his wrists. His hands are a mess, covered in black blood and he has two broken fingers, so Cas gets up to the infirmary and comes back with a bottle of rum and a water bucket and some bandages. Dean's still where he left him, sitting on the floor and looking so utterly broken. It hurts to see him like this, to see Dean like this, Dean who'd always been the problemsolver, the caretaker, the saviour.  
'We need to get up', Cas says and hits the buttons with shaky fingers and the engines start running again.  
'Crowley's gonna-'  
'I don't care.'  
Dean nods and Cas sits down beside him. He takes Deans hands in his and starts cleaning off the blood, painting the floor around them red. 'I'm sorry I hit you', he says, again. 'Well, I'm not. I would have broken that glass if you hadn't stopped me.' 'I don't think you could break that glass-' Water pressure he wants to say, bullet-proof glass, but he doesn't because he's not so sure about that anymore. He's not sure about anything anymore. 'What was that?', Dean breathes as Cas' starting to wrap bandages around his wounds. 'Cas, what the hell was that?' 'I don't know. But for the first time, in a long time, I am afraid.' Dean actually starts laughing at that. 'You're afraid? Never thought I'd see the day.' 'I think seeing the body of a dead loved one moving around is a valid reason for being afraid. We'd be fools if that wouldn't bother us.' 'We are fools Cas. I mean why the hell are we even here? No, forget that, why the hell are you even here?' It's a question Dean's been sitting on for awhile. Cas has felt him on the verge of asking it before, but he never did and Cas never felt like doing the job for him and telling him straight away. 'Why wouldn't I be here', he asks instead. He's finished the bandaging but doesn't feel like letting Deans hands go just now. 'Because I led you and Jo out here, into this creepy-ass nowhereland where there are no rules and no one's gonna miss us, where we met fucking Crowley and now probably the devil himself. Because your family's still there. Because you could get back to your job or whatever the hell it was you were doing, you still haven't told me that, you could get back to your life and if you had any sense of self-preservation you would. Because you've still got something to live for and I'm on a suicide run ever since Sammy died. So tell me why you're still here.' 'Because you're on a suicide run ever since Sam died', Cas answers simply. 'And because I've got a crush on you since forever and I can't have you dying on me now. It would ruin the tale I'm going to tell my grandchildren one day: how Dean and I met and how we lived a long and happy life.' Dean sort of laughs at that, like someone's punched him in the chest, and then he says, 'I fucking love you, Cas' and closes the distance between them so he can hide his face in Cas' shirt and Cas can let go of his hands and hold him and soothe his fingers through Deans hair until Dean drifts off. He dreams about Sammy and the devil and at some point there's no difference between them anymore, but it's okay because when he wakes up again Cas is still there and he's still holding him, caressing the sweat out of his hair. Dean knows he's been talking in his sleep, screaming probably, and Cas is trying to calm him down with his voice. 'Breathe. Dean, breathe. It's alright, but please you need to breathe if you want to live.' And so Dean breathes.

They hit the surface way too fast, the submarine's still halfway covered in water as Dean opens the hatch and starts climbing out. He helps Cas out and they both fall down onto the pier that goes from the station to where the submarine lands just atop of the trench. The pier's unstable and wooden and they have to rebuild it every three weeks after the bigger storms, Dean can feel the ocean underneath it, and he and Cas just lay there, waiting for something to happen. It takes about two minutes, then Meg and Ruby come running across the pier. Meg takes care of Cas and Ruby literally picks Dean up and helps him back to the station, she's not saying anything but Dean can hear her thinking behind her face and when they stumble into the conference room Crowley's there and Ruby says 'oh, brother.' Dean's got no time to think about why it is that people he's in no way related to keep calling him brother, because Crowley's suddenly way into Deans personal space. 'You're early', Crowley says, dangerously calm and easy, 'why is it that you're early?' 'Jesus, Crowley, back off', Meg says in that bored-amused voice of hers. She helps Cas down on a chair and pats his head. 'What happened, boys?' 'Sam', Dean spits out before he himself or Cas can stop him. 'Who's Sam?' Crowley asks. 'His dead brother, of course.' That's Rowena- none of them had seen her entering the room. She's all in black today, like mother, like son or some shit, and she wears fucking glittery makeup like they're not in the middle of nowhere. 'How do you- how the fuck do you know that?' 'Oh, I know lots of things, Dean Winchester', says Rowena smugly, and now Dean's really freaking out because he's never told them his last name- hell he hasn't used his last name since the day Sammy died. 'She's kidding. She looked you up', Crowley tries to soothe, but Dean's already across the room and in front of her. He realizes he hasn't got that much of a height advantage like he hoped he would, especially not with her wearing high heels. 'Alright then tell me, Rowena', he spits out, because he's really, really got enough of her creepy shit and wants to get this over with, wants to know who the hell she is, 'what do you know about me?' 'Oh, everything. I know that your mother burned to death screaming when you were just a child. I know your daddy left you and your babybrother when you were fifteen and he was still a little boy. I know that you know how to be a brother and not much else. I know that when you were sixteen you let a stranger fuck you in the backseat of his car to pay for your brothers school- that's haunting you, isn't it? I know that Sam is the first thought in your head every morning and the last thing on your mind before you go to sleep, has been since forever, and now he's dead and you don't know who you are anymore. I know that when he was gone you dreamt of dying every night, so you and your punk sister and your boytoy here stole a boat and sailed and sailed until you found us. And now you've got that feeling- like you can't leave. Like you've sold your soul. You want me to go on?'  
'No', Dean breathes. 'Just shut the hell up.' Rowena smiles like she's won a medal, and Dean doesn't look at Cas who's eating him up with his big blue eyes because if he does he might cry and he's not gonna let Rowena see that, ever.  
'So let me get this straight', Meg says after five minutes or so, because no one else looks like they're about to start talking again. 'You saw your dead brother walking around on the bottom of the rift?' 'Not on the bottom but yes, it looked like Sam', answers Cas on Deans behalf. 'Well that's just fantastic', says Meg. 'When do we leave and never come back?' 'No one's leaving', says Rowena. 'That's not for you to decide', starts Ruby, but Crowley shuts her up with just a look. He's doing that thing where he radiates power again. 'Like she said: no one's leaving. What's the plan Rowena?' 'We need to get down and find it, of course. All of us. As soon as the next time frame opens, which is in about twelve hours, if I'm correct.'  
'Rowena you're gorgeous and your essays on feminism are probably the best thing that was ever written, also you're the only friend I had since I went to college, Ruby doesn't count because we fuck, but you need to start talking right now', says Meg. 'What's with that time frame crap you've been talking about since forever, what does that even mean? And while we're at it, please tell us what we're doing here, diving down into this rift, and now you want us to look for- what exactly? A dead boy? I think we earned the right to know.' Rowena considers this for a long time.  
'This is not a rift', she says, finally. 'And that thing is no man. My son and I, we're not exactly geologists. We are specialists of foreign things. We have been looking for this particular foreign thing for a long time now, and it is vitally important that we get rid of it.'  
'How- foreign- exactly?' 'Foreign like the darkness and moving shadows and pain and fire and blood. Foreign like the devil and the end of all that is.'  
Ruby's the first to recover. 'Well it's been fun. I've got nothing against you all commiting suicide, but me and Meg, we're out of here.' 'You haven't got a boat', Crowley points out. 'So we swim.' 'I will enjoy watching you drown, darling.' 'Don't call my girlfriend your darling, asshole', says Meg, and Crowley actually backs off at that. 'Okay. Children. I know this is hard to understand. And I know it hasn't always been easy, partly that's on me, I enjoy beating on you all way too much- but this is important. More important than everything you will ever know. So I'm sorry, but it's really simple. There's no boat left, the only way out is the submarine, which I know how to operate way better than any of you, so don't start getting ideas of mutiny, you'll never reach the shore. There are explosive devices all over this station and I will blow them up as soon as Rowena and I are in the submarine. So you either come with us or you die. We're leaving nine am.'

That night Dean feels like- he feels like tying up loose ends. So he heads out of his cabin, looks across the corridor where Cas sleeps, lingers there, considering to just enter his room and doing what he what he wanted to do since day one. Since the night they met, when there was this otherworldly thunderstorm and they both somehow ended up in that creepy old barn, a long time ago back when everything was still alright and Sam was still going to school and Dean still had a future. Maybe if he'd done it, then, they wouldn't have ended up here.  
He turns away instead and goes looking for Crowley.  
Dean finds him in the kitchen. He's sitting in darkness and he's all alone, so Dean gets a bottle of whisky from the counter and two glasses and sits down beside him.  
'That's my best whisky', Crowley points out as Dean fills both glasses to the top. 'Yeah it's not like you're going to drink it any other day. Devil and all that.' Dean sniffs at the whisky and hands one glass over to Crowley. 'Okay so come on, man, spill. Why are we going down into hell.' 'It's not- it's not hell', Crowley says, mildly amused. 'As if you'd know.' 'I do, actually.' 'Are you kidding me?' 'Never crossed my mind. But we are going down- you, me, all of us- because mother said we should.' 'Cut the shit, Crowley, I know she's not your mother.' 'She is', Crowley insists. 'I would also prefer it if she wasn't -she was a terrible mother- but she is.' 'She can't be. I mean, have you looked at her?' 'I try not to. Oedipus, and all that. It's weird when you and your mother look about the same age.' 'You don't- you don't look the same age, Crowley. But. Whatever. Look man, I'm not saying let's not, but- let's not? You haven't seen it, okay. I mean, it was fucking Sam. It wore the face of my dead brother. How much worse can it get.' 'Oh love'- Dean hates it when Crowley gets like that, all patriarchal sugardaddy who knows so much more than you do- 'you've got no idea how bad it can get. Believe me- mother says we should go down, we go down.' 'And then what? Are we gonna talk to it? Reason with it? Play a round of pool or, or poker? I'm real good at both. We could bet my soul in a round of poker against the devil. That would be real fun.' 'Do I look like I know? I've got no bloody clue. Rowena's gonna figure something out. She always does.' 'Okay fine. It's real nice that you got all your hope on Rowena but I'm nowhere near that level of trust. I mean, no disrespect but can't you like, do that yourself? Do you really need us to help you save the world?' 'The rift doesn't open for Rowena and me', Crowley says, and he's getting loud now. 'Don't you think we tried? Hell we tried for months, but somehow we're not allowed down there. So we need you. We need your presence to cancel our presence out so to speak. I don't want any of you dead- granted, I really hate Meg, but Ruby's sassy and Cas' a decent enough cook and you're the prettiest boy I've ever seen- I don't want you kiddos dying but we need you, all of you, or things are about to get really ugly really quick.'  
None of them speak up again for a while after that.  
'What is it, Dean, hm?', Crowley finally asks. 'You didn't come here to talk me out of it, you're far too suicidal for that.' 'I-' Dean shakes his head, 'No. I wanna know why it looked like Sam.' Crowleys expression goes all soft and that's just wrong. He's not supposed to be like this. He's not supposed to be insightful and nice when he's practically lining them up for slaughterhouse. He's not supposed to care. 'I don't know. Maybe to mess with your head. Or maybe-' He stops, as if he suddenly doesn't think it's a good idea to elaborate anymore. 'How did your brother die?', he asks instead. Dean can't. He just can't. He's never told anyone about this, hasn't talked about it, not even to Jo or Cas even though they know- even though they were there to pick up the pieces as he shattered and refused to leave him there to die beside his brother the way they should have. He planned on dying with this story still beneath his tongue. He thought if he kept it forever-  
Maybe it's because Crowley didn't know Sam, or maybe it's because Dean recognizes that particular kind of red and empty and violently bleeding darkness within Crowley, or maybe it's simply that he just can't hold it in any longer, but somehow he hears himself answering. 'He- he drowned. In a bathtub. He was doing morphine. I was the one who-' Went out to get hooked up in a dark alley and left him all alone. Had to find him. Is to blame. It's one of those stories Dean swore he won't ever tell, and yet here he is, spilling, and it's coming out like toxic waste until Dean's just an emptied shell. And Crowely listens, dark and calm. 'I'm sorry', he says after Dean's finished. 'But you know, killing yourself won't make it right. Saving the world will make it right.' 

Dean enters Cas' cabin without knocking because he never does and it would be weird to start it now. 'Dean', Cas says without turning around. He's still awake, sitting on his bed writing something in a small green notebook. 'Yeah. Cas. Listen- I know it's probably the worst timing ever, and I just had an emotional breakdown in front of Crowley, and you're probably not in the mood, but chances are we're gonna die tomorrow, so I figured, well-' 'Well what?', Cas says, and now he's just being an asshole, Dean can hear the smugness in his voice. 'Well I thought maybe you'd like me to suck you off.' 'If you're offering it like that it would be really impolite to decline', Cas says and looks up and grins at him. 'Please, come in. And close the door?' Dean does and takes a few steps into Cas' room and stops in front of his bed. 'What are you doing, anyway', Dean says, because now that he knows it's going to happen he might as well take all the time he wants. 'Don't laugh- you're going to laugh, I know it. I'm writing down what has happened to us here. I have been for some time now. I knew you were going to laugh.' It shouldn't be funny, but somehow it is. It's just, the thought someone's gonna find this thing in fifty years or so and how freaked that someone's gonna be after reading all the shit Cas' written. 'You gonna write about that next part, too?' Dean asks. 'No. I'm gonna stop now', Cas says and puts the notebook away. Dean looks at him, he's still wearing his working clothes, that stupid red buddha t-shirt and grey trousers and neither shoes nor socks, so he says 'I can't do it if you got your working clothes on', and Cas' got nothing witty to say to that so he starts to unclothe. He takes his time, and by the time he's down to blue underwear- who wears blue underwear- Dean's a little shaky although he's never gonna admit that and he drops to his knees. He lays his head in Cas' lap and wraps his arms around his abdomen and traces with his fingers the structure of the muscles on Cas stomach. Cas' got his hands in Deans hair, they both need a shower and haven't shaved in days and Dean thinks he could stay like this forever, and then he finds the beginning of Cas' hair trail and it's only natural that he pushes his hand down, down into the warmth. He can feel Cas getting hard right there. 'Jesus, Dean', Cas says as Dean starts moving his hand, and that's enough for Dean to stop teasing so he pushes Cas' underwear down as far as he's got time to and then he takes Cas in his mouth. 'Dean.' Dean's barely started and Cas is already trembling, his fingers are still in Deans hair and he's doing something between pulling and caressing, like he wants to be gentle about it but he also needs it really bad. 'Dean- Dean, stop', Cas says and Dean stops. 'What- I can't come in your mouth after thirty seconds, I'm not a bloody teenager', Cas grits through his teeth after Dean shoots him a look. Dean's got something really funny to say to that but he doesn't get the chance, Cas urges him up and kisses him and then they're on the bed and Cas says, 'why are you still wearing your clothes, what is wrong with you', and Dean does as he's told. And then he's on his back and Cas' got a hand in between them and his other hand is in Deans face, tracing the border of his lips, and Dean can feel the air Cas is breathing into his mouth and it tastes like honey and salt.  
And after, when Dean's cleaned up the mess they've made- Cas is sprawled out on the bed and there's just no way of talking him into getting up again- Dean tries to cover Cas' body with his own, aligns their fingers and arms and legs, rests his head on the pillow and he can feel Cas breathing beneath him and he thinks for the first time in what feels like all his life that he wants to live- just a little while longer.

The following morning hits them like a thunderstorm. It's dark outside like always when Crowley turns on the sirens and their disturbingly violent noise fills the station. 'What is that', Cas says, except Dean can't really hear him because it's just too loud, he reads it off Cas' lips and his expression- Cas looks like he's about to cry, he's not exactly a morning person or even a getting-up at all kind of guy. 'Crowley', Dean answers as loud as he can. 'How did I deserve this', Cas whines, 'Dean!', like it's within Deans power to make it alright, so Dean reels Cas in and wraps his arms around Cas' head and tries to cover his ears with his hands. The sirens go on for ten minutes and then they stop, and Cas sort of collapses in Deans arms. 'I'm going to kill him', he says. 'If he didn't make coffee- if he did this, and didn't at least make coffee, I am going to kill him, I swear.'  
Crowley did make coffee. He's sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for them to join him, Meg and Ruby are already there and even Rowena's present although she's not really drinking coffee, just sort of staring down onto it like it's some sort of poison and Dean realizes he's not really seen her eat or drink, like, ever. 'Glad that all of you decided to show up', Crowley says. 'It's not like you were giving us a choice. If you turn on the sirens again I'm going to carve out your heart', Cas says and pours himself a cup of coffee and sits down and continues. 'So, I've been thinking. If we are going to die, then I think we should tell each other friendly things to say goodbye- how glad we are that we met, how good our time together was, and so on.' 'Are you kidding me, it was awful', Ruby says. 'You're such a down person Ruby. Certainly not all of it was awful?' 'Okay sunnyboy, maybe not all of it. I met Meg, so that turned out okay. And I liked playing strip-poker with Dean and Benny and Crowley- I guess you didn't know about that one, Dean said you'd forbidden him to play poker or any game where he could lose money ever again.' Cas looks from Ruby to Dean and goes all snippy. 'Well it's nice to know my advices are followed. How much money did you lose, Dean?'  
'I liked this', Dean says deliberately ignoring Cas and points at the table. 'Sitting down, eating, drinking together, you know, normal people stuff.' 'Rowena showed me and Jo how to dye our hair without actual dye, which is awesome', says Meg. 'I liked the strip-poker too, especially that one night you wore those Dr. Sexy underpants Dean, that was hilarious', says Crowley and he and Ruby start laughing and Dean says, 'it's a TV show, dumbass', but nobody cares. 'I'm sorry to ruin this heart-warming sharing and caring conversation', says Rowena and she doesn't sound sorry at all, 'but if we are going to do this, we should do it now. It's nine am, the rift is about to open.'

Rowena finally lets them in on her plan when they're one and a half days deep. No one's slept since they left the station, so she keeps it simple: find the devil, close the rift, rift swallows devil, easiest thing. They're way past the point of arguing so no one asks how she intends to close the rift or if there's any chance that some or even one of them will make it out alive.  
Things get messy a little while after that- Cas' sitting in the control seat beside Crowley, Rowena's reading half-loud out of a creepy old book, Meg and Ruby are whispering about something that's clearly no one else's business and Dean is restless. He's been walking round the submarine since they left the surface, he's lost count of how many times he already checked the hatches, the corners, the windows, the rooms but he can't cut it out- he can't. Cas tried to stop him once or twice but quickly backed off after he saw the look on Deans face, and so Dean keeps on walking like an overeager merry-go-round.  
'Dean', someone says, but the voice doesn't reach his brain from his ears, it comes from somewhere else, somewhere within his own body, probably his heart. And oh, Dean knows that voice. He's been conditioned to it, he'd love and kill and die if that voice asked him to.  
'Sammy', he says, and that's when he realizes he's made his way back to the control center and is painting sigils he doesn't recognize onto the walls and the floor and he's painting them with his own blood that's leaking out of wounds he doesn't remember getting. He doesn't know how long he's been doing this; everybody's staring at him like they're in shock and can't move- they almost seem afraid of him and maybe they need to be. 'I'm not- I'm not loosing my mind', he says as if that would make it true. The submarine starts shaking, then, the power goes out and the emergency lights kick in and paint everything in their dim red shine.  
'Someone get him the hell out of here!', Crowley screams, and everybody seems to wake up; Cas' standing there like he doesn't know whom to trust but Meg and Ruby overpower Dean easily and carry him into the empty room. They lock the door, but that doesn't help because when Dean turns, Sammy's there.  
'You're not my brother', Dean says because that's what Cas has told him so it must be true, and Lucifer smiles. 'No.Your brother is dead. You and I, we killed him, and wasn't that fun?' 'I didn't', starts Dean, but he doesn't know how to finish that sentence, and Lucifer just continues. 'Do you want to know what his last thought was, right before he died? - Dean will fix this. Isn't that just the saddest thing you've ever heard?' 'Why', Dean breathes, 'why are you-' 'Doing this? Wearing his rotting body like a fancy dress? Because I liked him- rebel like me, hated by daddy and abandoned by big brother like me. I would have made him the prince of darkness if he'd wanted to- but no, the boy didn't like the things I showed him in his dreams, so he chose to shoot himself some morphine and drown in a sad little bathtub in a sad little town instead.' Lucifer moves closer to Dean, and everything about him just screams: it's your time to go.  
Dean's drowning, then, there's water and blood coming out of his mouth and his nostrils, he tries to curse or scream but he can't even breathe anymore because of the pain in his lungs and he thinks now he gets to die beside Sammy after all.  
This is when Rowena saves him- Dean doesn't know how she got in here but she's standing in the middle of the room, and Lucifer turns away from Dean and the water is gone and he can breathe again- he can hear himself gasping for air, can feel the oxygen rushing into his lungs and getting taken away by the redness of his blood and it's pathetic how desperate he suddenly is to live.  
'Lucifer', says Rowena casually, like they're fucking classmates from highschool who copied notes from each other and probably fooled around once or twice. 'You're a long way away from hell.' 'So is your son.' Crowley's appeared in the door frame, and he looks at Lucifer in a way Dean won't ever forget and if that doesn't just scare him to the bone-  
Lucifer has got his eyes on Crowley and now there's a predatory hunger in his smile that looks wrong and alien on Sams mouth. He starts moving in Crowleys direction, deliberately slow and alpha, and Crowley just stands there like a scared little boy.  
'You took him away from me without paying Rowena, and I don't like having my playthings taken by other kids.'  
'Leave him be. He's no longer yours to torture.' Rowena, unlike Crowley, doesn't look scared at all.  
'Oh but he is.' Lucifer takes another step in his direction, moves his hand as if to cup his face and Crowley flinches away. 'You're afraid of me? Still? That's adorable. You know what, I'll make you a deal', the devil says. 'Come home with me and I'll leave this world for good.'  
'I won't let you take my son. Again.' Rowena is furious now. She's burning, there are blue flames around her head and on her arms and to her feet, and Lucifer turns to look at her and something within the room shifts. There's a clash of fury or power or darkness happening here that Dean can't begin to comprehend-  
and Crowley's finally remembered how to move and is standing in front of Dean, looking like he's got some sort of genius plan.  
'I know I don't deserve your friendship, Dean', he says. 'But I am grateful for it nevertheless.' It feels like goodbye- of the sort that lasts. 'What are you', starts Dean, but he doesn't get the chance to finish. Crowley cups a hand on Deans neck and kisses him on the mouth- not like a lover; like a friend- and then he shoves him backwards and Dean falls and when he hits the ground it's not metal but grass and sand and stones.  
The submarine's gone and Crowley's gone and Lucifer and Rowena are gone as well. He's on the shore, the same shore he set sails with Jo and Cas a long, long time ago, and someone calls his name. Cas is here and Meg and Ruby, they all look used up and disoriented but whole and then Cas is by his side and hugs him like he's never gonna let go again and Dean's forced to lie back into the sand. 'How did we get here? What happened?', Cas asks, but Dean can't answer because he doesn't know. So he resumes to lying there and breathing, he looks up and the sky's still dark above them but there's this red ball slowly heaving itself over the horizon and Dean remembers that this – this is the sun.

It takes them weeks to find the place again and when they do the station is abandoned and it doesn't look like Crowley or Rowena have been there to clean things up. The table where they'd been drinking coffee that last morning looks like they've just left, pushed-back chairs and half-empty mugs.  
Meg who's the only one who knows how to proper scuba dive even goes down again, but after she just shakes her head. 'There is no rift', she says as she climbs onto the pier. 'No submarine either. Just the bottom of the ocean, like it's always been there, not even that deep. I brought you some stones.'  
Dean and Cas go clean up the station while Meg and Ruby prepare the boat. None of them owned anything they want to keep and they don't know what to do with the things Rowena and Crowley left behind, so they decide to burn it all. They burn Cas' notebook, Megs Black Sabbath posters and the already rotting food in the kitchen, Rowenas books and carpets and goblets and all the weird things they'll never know what they're for, they burn Crowleys suits and at some point Dean finds a picture of a young man, almost a boy- your son Gavin, says the back of the picture in a handwriting Dean's never seen.  
'Now, Cas, what do you think?', Dean asks Cas as they're watching the flames eat away who they'd been. 'Should we go and meet up with Jo and Benny?' Cas smiles at that. He still hasn't shaved and he's still wearing a buddha t-shirt and he'll probably be doing yoga and being an asshole in the morning forever. 'Yes. I definitely think we should.' Then again, Cas can't swim and he won't mind never setting foot on a bloody ship or a submarine or anything related to an ocean ever again, so maybe, probably, in a long time from now they'll wake up one morning and things will be okay. Dean kisses him, there, between the doorstep and the smoldering pile of obsolete things.  
'Do you think they did it?', Cas asks Dean later, when Ruby's already setting sail and they're about to leave for good. 'Do you think the rift swallowed them all?'  
'Maybe', Dean says, and tries not to think about the alternative: about Crowley flinching away from the devil and you know what, I'll make you a deal. 'Maybe.'

**Author's Note:**

> Please, please do tell me what you thought of it. Tell me what you liked, and, more importantly, what you didn't like (I love being criticised). Was it good? Was it bad? Did you feel the Endverse-Castiel vibe? Do I use too many dashes? (I know I do)  
> Also, the title's stolen from that song by the Black Keys called Little Black Submarines which played in an endless loop when I was writing this.


End file.
